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 From: Dave Zamierowski Ugandan Journal Essay #5 (trip date May, 2009); Essay date August 16, 2010 Jinja......... I stood mesmerized. This was not what I expected. Instead of cascading water, we had an almost ominous still surface, just suggesting the forces and power beneath. We were on a little island, a pile of rocks (Jinja means "rocks") that we had motored out to in the tour boat. Our guide had beached the boat on the west side, the "still" side, and we crossed the island in 10 steps to the "rushing side." There, less than 20 feet away stood the concrete or stone monument that marked the "zero point" of the Nile river, separated from us by a channel of dangerous, rapidly rushing water flowing out of Lake Victoria - dangerous because some members of our group were looking at the green-covered slick rocks just below the surface thinking they might be able to walk across and actually touch the monument - until I started screaming, thinking of how we would explain that we had lost them. We had heard stories of people swept away at this very spot. But there is an almost magnetic attraction to the monument and to this spot and "Jinja" means rocks - these rocks that were the stepping stones of this bridge point across the Nile from ancient times. The stones were green just as everything here at this altitude at the equator with this much water now during the "rainy" season, was green. They don't have winter and summer - they have wet and dry seasons. But here in Lake Victoria it is always wet. The moss and algae grow in such abundance that on the Lake's west shore at the resorts along the way to Entebbe south of Kampala, the rolling waves look like pea soup. This is the second largest body of fresh water in the world and some of the falls along the upper Nile are among the largest in the world. This water would travel from the spot where we stood, the Source of the Nile, across Uganda then up through the deserts of Sudan and Egypt before it would reach the Mediterranean, some 4000 miles away. This is the world's longest river and here we were standing at the zero mile marker. Just amazing. But it was the still waters on the opposite west side of this island at "The Source" that so fascinated me. From this side we had a good look south into Lake Victoria. Our guide told us that we were sheltered from the rolling waves of the open lake by the large islands we saw in the distance. But there was still a stiff breeze and the wind ripples on the water were quite evident. But about 50 or 60 ft away on this side of the island, they just stopped. In fact as you watched the water, the ripples here seemed to go the other direction. It took some watching to orient oneself as our guide explained that here was the source - massive subterranean springs releasing volumes of water. As I watched, I began to make out the circle of ripples spreading outward. The smooth surface was in contrast to the wind ripples elsewhere. It slowly begins to dawn on one that the power of this spring was moving the flow from Lake Victoria the opposite direction in this spot. What a metaphor for Uganda. So still and calm looking on the surface, but such power and force going on underneath. Like the keystone block at the top of a stone arch, landlocked Uganda sits at the west-center of the arch of East Africa. From Somalia and Ethiopia in the Horn of Africa, through Uganda's immediate neighbors, Kenya to the northeast and Tanzania to the southeast, these countries form an arch that meets the important ports on the Indian Ocean. It is difficult to think of Uganda as landlocked when one is looking out at Lake Victoria. It is more like the bridge, the center - and that is the meaning of Jinja. The view we were looking at of the source of the Nile is now very different since the construction of the hydroelectric power dam at Jinja. The water level is higher and most of the "rocks," except for a few like the monument island we had beached on, are underwater. But this site is ancient and provided a stepping-stone bridge for people and commerce. If we consider that there is no other good natural crossing point all the way from the southern shores of Lake Victoria, which look out 250 miles across the Serenghetti to Mount Kilimanjaro, all the way north down the Nile until the river begins to flatten and broaden in the desert, then the strategic importance of ancient Jinja becomes evident. And even now, today, it is a critical commercial transport point. We made the 50 mile trip there from Kampala traveling by van on the Trans-African Highway, passing lorry after lorry full of goods from the Indian Ocean port of Mombasa in Kenya on their way to Kampala and the countries of central Africa. The journey is an experience. You pass through the dense jungle of the National Forest Preserve. And through the open hills planted in the serial rotation patterns of a continuous growing season with tea leaves and sugar cane on gigantic plantations. And of course, when you get to Jinja, you pass the Nile Brewery. The setting for this country of Uganda is dramatic with the western border formed by the Rwenzori mountain range - permanently snow-capped at 16,000 ft, they create the monsoon rains that make Uganda so fertile. The home of the Silver-backed Gorillas in these mountains is difficult to reach, but remains a tourist attraction. Lake Victoria. The Nile River. To travel this country is to experience the tingling sensation that "yes, it was probably here in East Africa that mankind first emerged from the forest and our ancestors separated themselves from the apes and chimps." To the east in Kenya and Tanzania is the Rift Valley. It is our good fortune that the sediment deposits there immediately buried and preserved our early ancestors when they died crossing this area, and now the erosion of this sediment, exposing these archaeological findings, gives us some insight into our beginnings. We have all heard of the two million year old Lucy skeleton, and recently a National Geographic Magazine issue featured a four million year old hominid precursor skeleton found there. You can just imagine when you are here, that perhaps the first fertile plains our ancestors left the trees of the forest and mountains for, was the plains of Uganda. This place gets to you when you are here. Just as the giant springs of Jinja stop things for a moment, being here lets you look backward and forward somehow. East Africa is a vital and strategic place for us. We need to be here. Yes, we are starting a school. But we need to be here to learn, not just to teach.
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